2019 Gender Diversity Index Key Findings

Big Companies Lead; Small Companies Lag Behind.
Women now hold 20.4% of the board seats of R3000 companies, an increase from 17.7% in 2018. The percentage of women in the 100 largest companies is 27.7%; in the 1,000 smallest companies it is 15.7%.

W Companies Rise, Z Companies Fall.
Fifty-two percent of R3000 companies are Winning W companies, with 20% or more of their board seats held by women, up from 43% in 2018. The number of Zero Z companies decreased by 25% from 497 to 311 companies. Despite these improvements, 41% of R3000 companies still have one or no women on their boards.

Seventeen States Exceed Goal.
Sixty-five percent of the 26 states with at least 20 companies exceed the 20% goal in 2019, up from four states in 2018 and one state in 2017.

Industry Sectors Show Progress.
Women now hold more than 20% of the board seats in five of nine industrial sectors, up from two in 2018. The percentage of women-held board seats improved across all sectors.

Women Gain Board Seats, Men Lose Them.
From 2018 to 2019, women gained 811 board seats (net) while men lost 358 board seats (net). Sixty-four percent of companies that added women did so by increasing the size of the board.

WVTZ TrendsMore companies are Winning W companies than ever before, with close to a 10% increase from last year. There is also a sharp drop in the number of Zero Z companies, consistent with our findings that women are making dramatic strides in public company boardrooms. While the number of Transforming T companies dropped slightly, this is due to 180 Z companies adding one woman and 235 T companies (with one woman) adding one or more women or losing some men to become W companies. Twenty-five percent of companies (720) have three or more women on their boards and four percent of companies (116) have reached gender balance, trends that we will watch more closely in the next few years.